Thursday, September 22, 2011

Wallace Stevens on a glass of water

There seems to be tons of literature on Wallace Stevens and his poetry. Should I read it all and carefully compare it with my own thoughts; correct them, refine them and write a piece at the end of all that work, I never would have gotten around to put down a word on his work.

And this I just can't allow, as interesting and mind-tickling as his poetry is.

Take "The glass of water", for instance:

THE GLASS OF WATER

That the glass would melt in heat,
That the water would freeze in cold,
Shows that this object is merely a state,
One of many, between two poles. So,
In the metaphysical, there are these poles.

Here in the centre stands the glass. Light
Is the lion that comes down to drink. There
And in that state, the glass is a pool.
Ruddy are his eyes and ruddy are his claws
When light comes down to wet his frothy jaws

And in the water winding weeds move round.
And there and in another state – the refractions,
Themetaphysica, the
plastic parts of poems
Crash in the mind – But, fat Jocundus, worrying
About what stands here in the centre, not the glass,

But in the centre of our lives, this time, this day,
It is a state, this spring among the politicians
Playing cards. In a village of the indigenes,
One would have still to discover. Among the dogs and dung,
One would continue to contend with one’s ideas.

From Parts of a World, 1942, 1951

***

The object is merely a state
between two poles. Between nothingness and it-ness, perhaps. Between
endlessness and time? These propositions point to what Stevens himself probably
points towards – that
there is a continuum of existence, not stopping by the word or concept a glass
or water represent, but stretching out endlessly. Which, of course, is the same
as saying that nothing really is.

Stevens, a connoisseur of Asian
art, must have known well the Eastern way of looking at things directly and
immediately, existing only here and now – take zen as an example. A world
or world-view without time is quite hard to grasp for the Western mind; or
perhaps the human mind, driven as we are of appointments and schedules
and all of that.

The glass is a glass in this
moment, in this environment. In a much warmer environment, the glass will melt,
becoming something seemingly other. What else can the glass become? Gas, air,
stars? If we remove time, all of them.

Here in the centre stands the
glass. The centre, which is now, here (our ways of trying to pin down something
in time and space). When we see the glass now, it is a glass. That's what's
real to us. But in the metaphysical, according to Stevens, there are poles at each side of the object
we see – the glass. But why should the metaphysical be something else than what
is right here, right now; the glass and ourselves?

You could go all metaphysical about
this poem, but really, if you just take a straight look at it, read it and see
or sense directly what it is – what comes up? It seems to me
that it is circling around something, an underlying unity of sorts.

This poem, there is really no
beginning or end to it. There is a great sense of a loop of existence, wiping
out anything to do with beginnings and ends.

And of course there are lines that
stand out poetically. I particularily like that "the plastic part of poems
/ Crash in the mind" with "the refractions" and "theMetaphysica" (not in that
order, though). The metapoetic turns in many of Stevens' poems direct his poems
inward, toward some common poetic ground which is almost possible to see if you
squint through the words to look directly at it, rather than the words
themselves.

This too is a part to notice: "Here in the centre stands the glass. Light / Is the lion that comes down
to drink. There, and in that state, the glass is a pool." There, and in
that state, the glass is a pool. Doesn't this point to the relativity of
things? The glass of water is only a glass to us, but a pool to the
thirsty lion-light, bathing in the glass of water – which, from the light's perspective, is a pool of something clear and thirst-quenching.

"But in the centre of our lives, this time, this day / It is a state". There. He puts it simply and squarely. Things are not things, defined by borders like the edges of a glass, or the wetness of water. Things, what we call things, are states, different states of a great existing thing. To put it thingly.

Will we continue to contend with our ideas?

I guess so, but we don't have to.

We can settle with looking straight at things, taking them for what they are; not what we think they are.

About Me

This is a good life. Many books are yet unread, many mysteries yet unsolved, great depths of life still undiscovered. I am here to unveil as much of this peculiar existence of mine as possible. And then share some of it with you!

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